


Loyalty

by Bridget, Trojie



Category: Chronicles of Narnia - C. S. Lewis
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-07-21
Updated: 2010-07-21
Packaged: 2017-10-10 17:30:56
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 9,597
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/102290
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Bridget/pseuds/Bridget, https://archiveofourown.org/users/Trojie/pseuds/Trojie
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Edmund is at school in England, after the events of 'Prince Caspian', and trying to settle back to routine, but his thoughts and dreams are distracting him.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Loyalty

**Author's Note:**

> We do not own Edmund. Or Peter, or Susan, or Lucy, or 1940s English boarding schools, or Latin grammar, or Harlech Castle, or the works of Homer, Ovid, Plato ... y'know, it would be quicker to list what we do own, which is simply the pretty order of the words and our own overactive imaginations.
> 
> Contains fleeting mentions of non-con and pederasty, lots of overthinking, some Greek mythology, French verbs, English prepositions, and a sprinkling of Latin grammar. Set mostly bookverse with some elements taken from movieverse (primarily the tension between Peter and Caspian). Italics generally indicate a dream.
> 
> Beta-read by the rather spiffy Ineptshieldmaid.

School is harder, this time, than it was before. It is hard to settle to a routine of drudgery - grey days and grey food and grey school uniform - when one's daydreams are filled with fire and colour, horn calls in battle, the weight of armour across one's chest and a sword in one's hand. Edmund does his best, swots up and earns good marks and the praise of his teachers, although they do comment, amongst themselves, that Pevensie Minor is a bit vague. Off with the fairies.

It is harder this time; there seem to be more fights now. Some of the bigger boys are new, keen to throw their weight around.

Peter once warned him about the fights, and about standing out. 'Don't just take it,' he said. 'Don't get hurt. But don't show off, either, Ed, alright?'

Edmund took his brother's advice, fought just enough that they don't try to beat him any more, but there are other things the bigger boys do to the younger ones, in bathrooms or dorms, behind closed doors ... Edmund has not yet been caught by them, and does not intend to be. He will fight them properly if they try that. He knows they cannot best him, and maybe this shows, just a tiny bit, for they never do try it. Although he has caught those boys looking at him speculatively once or twice.

Peter often asks him if he is alright, says he is quieter than he used to be. They never mention Narnia. They especially never mention Caspian, and Edmund is happier this way, because once or twice, in those last days in Narnia, he caught Peter regarding the new King almost the same way that those older boys look at Edmund himself. Almost, though not with the same cold speculation - Peter's a lot of things, but cold is never one of them. Heated and passionate are words for Peter. Cold is usually saved for Edmund, along with calculating.

Edmund knows all the reasons his suspicions are ill-founded; older boys cornering younger boys is bullying, and Peter's not a bully. His chivalrous soul wouldn't stand it; love is one thing, force quite another. And Peter, at least in Narnia, would always have consulted Edmund on anything, anything at all, that was important. Edmund was his chief advisor, after all.

And then, as well, Peter's a very definite sort of person ... he knows who he is and what he can do, and while that sort of thing goes on at school, it's never the good boys. And Peter has always been a good boy; while these things happen, they happen behind closed doors, they happen in corners, in the dark. They happen in shame. Edmund's spent far too long watching and second-guessing his brother, making sure that he doesn't do anything to jeopardise diplomacy, to think he'd do anything that he couldn't be proud of.

When Peter's loved in the past, it's been passionate. It's been bright and beautiful, and it's been visible. He never made an alliance, but his flirtations were always the talk of the court; the daydreams of the maidens in service to Susan were always of being swept off their feet by Peter at some grand ball or other, daydreams full of every kind of colour and fire and grandeur.

But that's the point. Fire. Grandeur. Sweeping adventures. Heroics. All the things Peter is so at home with. Edmund watched Peter and Caspian fight with each other, and beside each other, both filled with the same burning need to be the leader, and that very heat has him feeling paranoid. He has suspicions. He has a question for his brother, but he dares not ask it, and comforts himself with the sure knowledge that Caspian kissed _him_, that last night on the tower, and not Peter.

It's hard not to be suspicious, though. Growing up in the midst of a war in England means that everything Edmund has ever had was a hand-me-down; clothes, toys ... Everything that was ever Edmund's was always Peter's first, and it's hard not to think that maybe he and Caspian ...

When Edmund goes to bed at nights, scratchy woollen blankets tucked up around his chin, it is usually with thoughts of that last kiss hovering in his mind. He isn't sure what to make of it. It was over too quickly to be sure, but Edmund is almost convinced that, had he followed Caspian, it might have turned into something more. And this thought excites him. More than anything, and more than ever, it is those moments in the hard bed at boarding school that make him yearn with all his heart to be back in Narnia. As if to spite him, his dreams have all been about Narnia, old memories and overheated desires thrown together, creating moments that never happened; their intensity meaning he wakes as exhausted as he went to bed.

***

_White, white, glistening white._

It draws him on, the whiteness glinting off beautifully proportioned horns. The white, the warm and bewitching white! It is all he needs, all he wants... untarnished, pure and clean. He has to touch it, to be first. It is enveloping him like a cloud, like fog around him, blurring his vision until all he can see is white, like a veil before his eyes.

'Edmund!'

Susan, his sister. She calls him. Why does she draw him from its perfection?

'Ed!'

All he wants is to touch it, to draw his hand across its perfect whiteness, to feel it beneath his hand, to lose himself in its form...

'Edmund!'

The stag turns to Edmund, looks him full in the face. He meets its eye, brown meeting brown, worlds of experience and emotion in one slow moment.

'Edmund! O brother! You must not touch it!'

He hears her not. Its fur under his fingers is more than he ever hoped to feel, lightning and rain and laughter and beautiful under his fingertips. He caresses it. What is wrong with touching this most wondrous of things, he wonders? The trees of Lantern Waste are already slipping out of focus, and the High King is barely there. He feels his sister calling, but all he feels is this fur, this fur that feels so much like Aslan's, filled with so much love.

The stag will grant wishes, they say. Edmund wishes for love, wishes for this. He reaches out, and all that he wanted is his and is here. Caspian's dark eyes are trusting, deep, solemn as a stag's.

Edmund lowers his face, burying it in the love he feels, losing himself within Caspian's love, until a scream wrenches him out.

Edmund's heart hammers. A scream, he is sure someone screamed. His sister? The boys in the dorm are all lost to the arms of Morpheus. There can have been no noise. What woke him?

He remembers the dream. He remembers the stag, remembers Caspian, remembers the wishes that come true.

Edmund sighs, buries his face in the pillow. He wishes for dreamless sleep, guiltless sleep. But when he eventually slips back into the darkness...

_ Before battle, a brief kiss in stolen time._

Slithering sounds of chainmail touching, tiny squeaks and scratching noises of pauldrons colliding as two boys entwine their arms around each other.

Their breath mingles, and it isn't just battle-fever that makes Edmund's heart beat so fast, it isn't just the knowledge that an army waits to cut them up that makes his knees feel like water.

This is the most intimate moment he has ever shared with someone. About to fight for lives, for country and crown, for freedom against tyranny, they may never see each other alive again. They've been naked together and entangled in each other, but they've never been so close as they are now. They are kings. They are warriors. They know the price of freedom and of a crown, and they will pay that price again and again, and here, armour-clad on the edge of a forest, they understand each other best, love each other most.

In a rush, Edmund knows why he had to leave Caspian. It was part of that price. As that thought crosses his mind, he moves to draw Caspian yet closer, damning the screech of armour, but suddenly the scene changes, the world is black, and Edmund is wearing only his nightshirt again.

'Aslan!' he roars, tried beyond all patience. 'Take me back!'

His cries have no effect.

***

It is with a degree of shame that Edmund awakes the next morning. Nocturnal noises aren't exactly unusual in the dorm, thanks to facts of nature vaguely alluded to by Matron during her regular lectures, but by some unwritten law no-one says a word. It has happened to them all before; waking up to the sullen stares of boys who've heard one moan in one's sleep. It's normal. But Edmund remembers, this time, what he was moaning about. _Caspian_. That knowledge makes his cheeks flame ever brighter than if it had been some nebulous female phantom.

Embarrassment is soon subsumed beneath boredom, however, as the school day wears on. In History, the master shakes his head at Edmund's imperfect recall of the details of the Wars of the Roses, and mutters under his breath as he turns away, 'Such a pity. His brother was so much more promising.'

Edmund's old friend, embarrassment, makes a return, and he ducks to avoid displaying his blush. That's the worst of being at school with one's brother; always to be in his shadow. _Just like in Narnia_, prompts a mean little voice in his head, and he fiercely bids it be silent. He knows he couldn't have ruled Narnia alone. Narnia needed a symbol, someone to be the antithesis, the very polar opposite of the Witch. Edmund was too close to her in temperament, for a start, and to have begun his adventures in Narnia by allying himself with her ... Even forgiven by Aslan, the Narnians would not have followed him.

_It's not like that at school, though. You don't have to be a symbol of anything. They ought to take you for who you are, not simply as Peter's brother..._

It's like this for every younger brother, he knows it. He just has to work through it and establish himself. It only grates on him so because he's known something else; while he may have been in Peter's shadow in Narnia, he was still himself, Edmund. Here, he is only Pevensie Minor. And that irks him.

***

That night, sleep is slow in coming, and Edmund twists the blankets around him roughly in an effort to distract himself from nagging memories. He has to ignore them. They cannot help him any more. If there is one thing Edmund prides himself on, it is his ability to be practical, to deal with the situation as it is. And as it is, he is in school. He must be a schoolboy. There is no practical reason for him to mull over, as he has been, the visit to Tashbaan and the negotiations with the Tisroc and his son for Susan's hand, or alternative tactics they could possibly have employed in the battles against Miraz. To distract himself he tries instead to recall the key events of the Siege of Troy.

It's a story he's always liked, though the constant lists of names bore him a tad. It's a good grounding in heroic tales, and being caught up in so much of that sort of thing in Narnia ... knowing his classics didn't hurt. Love and honour wind through it, and it pleased him once, in whimsy, to recast his friends and family in the roles of Greeks and Trojans, or at least to try. Though it is easy enough to see Peter as a mighty Menelaus, avenging his pride, or a Hector, defending his beloved city though his might in arms, and it strokes Edmund's pride not a little to envision himself a wily Odysseus, his sisters are more problematic, for neither is a Helen, property of whomsoever sheds the most blood, nor are they goddesses, Athene, Aphrodite, Hera, trying to turn the tides of battle for their own partisan ends. Eventually he gives up, having got no further than deciding unsatisfactorily that Peter could have been any of the heroes.

But the events of the siege... Where did it begin? It began, certainly, with the abduction of Helen by Paris, but that in itself was caused by Aphrodite and the contest of beauty that she won, and that in the end came down to the golden apple of the Hesperides ... do all of the great tales begin with an apple? Edmund suddenly wonders, recalling the stories of the founding of Narnia and the child Digory and his sick mother.

The apple isn't as important, though, as the love that Aphrodite nurtured between Paris and Helen, at least in the telling of the tale of Troy. But though that love may have launched a thousand ships, it is a different tale of love that stands out in the saga, though the Classics master cannot see it, or says he does not.

The master avers that Achilles and Patroclus were friends, holds them up as an example to the boys of companionship and loyalty ... but Plato called them lovers, and Ovid too. Edmund knows this thanks to Professor Kirke's extensive library and liberal views about what a boy should be permitted to read. Edmund's Greek and Latin were improved immeasurably by rainy days browsing through that library, and it is this that he recalls as he drifts off, at last, to sleep; a glossy black vase around which Zeus and Ganymede chase each other eternally, never to be united.

_The boy's face haunts him. It is all Edmund can see. It grows, in front of him, and the edges of it begin to swirl as he tries to make out the definition of the boy, the lips, the eyelashes, the perfect form... All he can see is that he is beautiful._

The noise and the stench of the great city of the Calormenes are around him, the ululating cries thrusting through his consciousness, but all he can see is the face, the face of this beautiful Calormene boy. Edmund wants him. He wants him so much it feels all his skin is on fire, his mind is lost, spiralling through melodies of lust that speak to something within his soul. He stares at the boy, his mind's eye tuning out the dust and the heat and his sister, walking at his side. Edmund sees nothing but the face, and the body, leaping out of the yellow dusty background to fill his mind... and the face _twists_. It is still beautiful, he is still a young man, on an errand to Calormen to forge a treaty, as is his role, he is here for his brother's sake, and his sisters' sakes, to make peace, barter, forge treaties, but the beauty of the face of this boy jumps at him, and, again, it _twists_...

And it is no longer a Calormene boy, taunting him with full lips and taut buttocks, but a Telmarine boy, a Telmarine boy pouting those glistening lips at Edmund, raising a finger to them, beckoning, drawing him closer, and it is Caspian, as the streets and alleys of Tashbaan fade around him and swirl into dust, all he can see is Caspian, looking, beckoning, wanting...

***

'...has two moons, Phobos and Deimos, or Fear and Terror, which doubtless your Classics master has told you is an allusion to the idea of Mars as the Roman god of War. Mars appears red in the night sky, which is how it can best be differentiated from the other planets visible with the naked eye ... Venus of course cannot be confused with any other celestial body ...'

_Alambil_, Edmund thinks blankly, and wonders why that word jumped into his mind.

Edmund feels at home when the physics master speaks of astronomy. Although the man is short and plump, with a frizzled beard and eyes obscured behind thick-lensed glasses, these lectures on the heavenly bodies and their appearances and symbolism is comfortingly close to the advice of the Centaurs. Last time he heard discourse on stars, it was Glenstorm, predicting victory as written in the sky in between advising on battle tactics. There is something awfully reassuring about Centaurs.  
The idea of the battle being decided by lights in the sky never sat too comfortably with Edmund, though he had appreciated the morale boost that news of some lucky conjunction or other gave to the men and Beasts under his command, but now knowledge of the stars seems much more familiar to him than Latin declensions, and much more welcome.

At dinner that night, slowly working his way through unappetising sausages and grey mashed potato, Edmund wracks his brain to remember the stars of Narnia. The Leopard, he remembers definitely, and the Spearhead, but other constellations elude him, like many details of the Golden Age, and the only other thing he can recall is the slow, solemn voice of Glenstorm, telling of the meeting of the Lord of Victory and the Lady of Peace, high above their heads, as they sat in council one night in the How.

Later, in Prep, he decides that he will stay awake. If he can stay awake all night tonight, by tomorrow night he will be so tired that he will be unable to dream, he hopes. So when lights-out comes, he gets into bed, but does all he can to prevent sleep from claiming him. He draws the covers up and sticks his feet out into the chill air, making a mental note to make sure his sheets are straightened extra-carefully in the morning to avoid the wrath of Matron, and he stares deliberately at the chink in the curtains, where the moon peeks through, her light hurting his eyes. Surely this will keep him awake. And just so that the time isn't wasted, he conjugates verbs and declines nouns and recites his multiplication tables in his head.

_Nominative, genitive, dative ... je suis, tu es, il est ... once eight is eight, two eights are sixteen, four eights are thirty two ..._

Tarva draws close.

Edmund watches, waiting, breath bated.

He is high, high upon the tower of a Telmarine castle, watching, watching, waiting. Nothing is so important as this moment.

Alambil is near. He draws breath, hardly daring to await the moment of union. He wants to look away; the Lord of Victory cannot win this dance. Edmund draws breath, feeling the stones of the tower shift under his feet.

Though he does not look, he feels them. Peace, and victory; they draw together, they meet, he feels their touch, and it wounds him to the very core. He inhales deeply, and tears his gaze away, though he never looked to begin with. The stars wheel, and blur. A hand covers his.

Edmund wrenches himself awake, once again. _Caspian_!

He breathes, slowly, steadily. He cannot think this. He _will not_ think this.

***

'Are you alright?' asks Peter casually, having contrived to position himself near to Edmund at breakfast the next morning. Edmund wishes he would go away. There are things he needs to avoid thinking about, and Peter's too close to all of them. _Trigonometry_, he tells himself firmly, in an effort to keep from thinking _Narnia_ or _Caspian_.

'I'm fine,' he replies shortly, spooning manfully at the porridge and trying to ignore the memory of breakfasting on fresh fruit and sweet unleavened breads in the Narnian sunshine. The detail of that thought goes some way to reminding him how unsuccessful he has been so far in not thinking about things.

'You look dreadful,' says Peter, with all the tact of an older brother. 'You should get some sleep. I suppose you're swotting up already?'

'Can't sleep,' Edmund mutters. 'Rain on the roof,' he adds, thinking that an explanation will divert Peter away from asking any more questions. Instead, Peter looks at him quizzically.

'Bit different, is it?' he asks. Anyone else would have thought that remark cryptic, but Edmund knows exactly what his brother is talking about. They'd left Narnia in glorious, riotous sunshine, clean and bright during the day and warm, lush and decadent at night, with the streams running red with Bacchus' wine. Rainwashed, slightly grubby England, where everything looks as if it were seen through a dirty window, is very much 'a bit different.' 'Best just get used to it,' Peter adds quietly, and actually meets Edmund's eyes this time. 'Holidays can't last forever,' he finishes.

It's all very well for Peter to say that, Edmund thinks. After all, it's over for him. He can concentrate on England now, on exams, on all that sort of thing. Edmund doesn't know when he might get called back, though. Doesn't know what the next sign from Aslan could be. He feels like he's got to be constantly on watch for Magic, for some sign. If he could just roll over and forget, it would almost be easier.

Almost. Peter's eyes hold a hint of wistfulness just for a moment, and then Edmund thinks that it would be easier still if he knew his brother would be going back with him, next time. But next time, Edmund will be oldest, will have to be in charge, will be the returning legend.

It worries him a little that the next thought that occurs is, if he were Narnia, calling for aid, would he be happy that Edmund the Just had turned up, or would he be wishing that Peter the Magnificent had come instead?

A third thought, a jealous, mean little thought, is that he's glad that Peter can't go back. The further his brother is from Caspian the happier Edmund is. But then he himself may never see Caspian again; there's no guarantee that he'll still be alive when -

_Trignonometry_, he says again to himself. _And Algebra, and Geometry. Cosines. Eat your damned porridge. _

'Try to sleep, Ed,' Peter says finally, seeing that Edmund's attention has wandered off again. 'Things'll get better.'

***

_Edmund is walking along the beach by the ruins of Cair Paravel again, his school jumper tied around his waist and his trousers rolled up over his knees, but he's alone this time. He knows that when he was here the first time, Susan and Lucy and Peter were with him, splashing and playing in the surf, but this time he is unhurried. The sun is warm and golden on his back, and he feels free. Untethered for once._

A splashing sound behind him makes him turn. Caspian is knee-deep in the sea, staring out towards the horizon. He turns as Edmund makes his way towards him, his smile as warm as the sunshine, his dark hair gilded by the bright morning light.

Kissing feels more real in the sunshine, Edmund realises, than it did in the moonlight. Somehow it feels more honest, as well. He tells himself that it isn't real, that it's a dream. But the slide of Caspian's mouth over his, the sureness with which the older king holds him and pulls him in tight, the lap of water around his knees ... all of these are so tangible, and his memory of the kiss in Narnia fades with time. Caspian pulls back, just a hair, and licks his lips, peering into Edmund's eyes. Edmund feels a blush rising on his cheeks. Caspian's arms are still wrapped around his shoulders, Edmund's own hands snug on Caspian's waist.

They caress each other gently, exploring without urgency. Who could be urgent or worried on such a glorious day? Edmund finds himself shirtless after a while, and pulls at Caspian's tunic and shirt, wanting to run his hands over sunwarmed bronze skin. Their movements are still languid and easy.

Eventually they are lying in the shallows, water lapping softly around them as they kiss, as they run their hands over each other. This is discovery, loving and almost chaste, innocent in design. They bask in sunshine, bask in love.

The sun is bright on the water around them, and Edmund smiles, just to be here. Just to be back in Narnia.

When Edmund wakes it's as if he hasn't slept at all, yet again, and to top it off he finds himself in a state that Matron would say was highly unhealthy. In order to save the bedsheets and his pyjamas, and to escape a horrible, ear-burningly embarrassing lecture on self-abuse, he gets up early to wash in cold water. For the rest of the day he goes through his lessons like a ghost, barely paying attention, dying to get back to his bed, though if he's honest, he hopes for another dream rather than peaceful slumber.

He does sleep that night, as it happens, but the next night he and Caspian are evading Telmarine soldiers by hiding in a tiny storeroom, and close confines lead to closenesses of another kind; insistent, desperate kisses and shaking hands making tentative but urgent forays beneath rumpled clothing. Again, Edmund awakes exhausted, breathing hard and feeling as if he'd been on the brink of something important. Again, a dream that seems to mix things that really happened with things that didn't; the silent moments before a pitched battle, or the storming of a castle, with feelings and desires and actions that never occurred.

The intensity of the dreams is starting to throw him. Dreams have never been this real before. He is afraid there is something wrong with him, some delusion that makes him dream obsessively of Narnia and of Caspian, but at the same time he is desperate for the next dream, and the next, and the next. It has to stop.

***

He doesn't think this.

_Fingers stroking across his chest..._

Declensions. He thinks of declensions.

_And up, across his neck, over his chin, coming to rest by his lips..._

No, not declensions. They're not doing Latin in Prep tonight. It's English, and he should be thinking of Grammar, not fingertips stroking across his lower lip and pulling his mouth open and darting inside and -

Grammar. Edmund thinks of Grammar. He can decline like nobody's business, and, by the Lion, he's going to decline, if that's what he has to do.

_Darting into his mouth, teasing his tongue, and he cannot help but nip and suck at it -_

No. Edmund shakes his head. Declensions. The Nominative case is the subject-

_Edmund is shaking his head, trying to deter Caspian, but Caspian won't be thrown off..._

The Genitive case indicates possession...

_Pulling him closer, a hand stealing down, closing over him, claiming him..._

...the Dative case is the recipient...

_Caspian's fingers leaving his mouth to caress his chin, drawing him closer, lips meeting lips, tongues ghosting over one another - _

Grammar. Not Latin. Edmund's utterly focused on his Prep, really. A preposition is a word that indicates a relationship, for instance 'on top of' ...

_He is being pulled down, sprawling over the older boy. Caspian's arms wind about him._

Caspian's lips claim him.

***

He gets a letter from Susan the next morning. It's full of news and little hints about writing back, and about looking after Peter. She and Lucy are doing well; Lu's settling into school quite happily, has made friends. Susan's a Prefect, something she's proud of, and she's had a letter from Mother and Father, they send their love ...

A letter from Lucy, infrequent as they are, is usually full of veiled references to Narnia, to Aslan, to adventures they had. _When we were ... And the time when ... Do you remember?_ But it seems like Susan is as determined to anchor herself here as Peter is, and try as he may, Edmund cannot discover any flash of Narnian fire in her prose, not even the spark that Peter sometimes shows when he's provoked.

_Do you remember, Su? Do you remember?_

He starts to write back that evening, but his mind wanders, and he ends up signing it as the Duke of Lantern Waste before he catches himself. He has to screw up that copy and begin again, for he notes on rereading that he's also managed to refer to Peter as 'our sovereign brother' and to mention Reepicheep twice in telling her about their days at school. If he were writing to Lucy that sort of slip would be met with a giggle and the letter kept to pore over later; Susan will simply write back with a stern reprimand and probably tell Peter to give him a sharp talking-to as well. This lack of sleep is getting beyond a joke.

_'Euan, euan, eu oi oi oi oi!' comes the cry, and Edmund blanches._

The streets of Tashbaan, dust and all, swirl haphazardly about him.

'Euan, oi oi oi!'

The yellow slowly turns to green; the forms of peasants and Tarkheenas slowly merge into Dryads and Fauns, dancing, laughing, inviting Edmund to join them.

He reaches, takes their hands, the calloused fingers of Fauns pulling him into the dance, and he throws himself into its bacchanalian delights.

The lights flicker, flame. So many flames, whirling through his vision, but all the while the Fauns dragging him onwards, twisting, spiralling, inwards through the dance. A bonfire burns wildly between them, and as Edmund stares into its depths he sees Lucy. His sister, staring at him, frowning, disapproving. He clutches tighter at the fingers within his, watching the snow fall and night spin, Caspian within his grasp. It is no good. Her face eyes him, cold, calculating. He watches, staring, falling into her eyes as she becomes yellower, golder, coldness turning to pity, to warmth, to love, to sorrow. Edmund wants to cry, her gaze hurts him so, and he clings tighter and tighter to Caspian's fingers within his own -

Sooner or later, Edmund thinks, Matron will start to suspect.

***

Lack of sleep causes Edmund's mind to wander in lessons again. After a morning of being too distracted to work on his mathematics problems properly, he is finally called to order by his History master.

'Pevensie, have you been paying the slightest bit of attention? Who held Harlech Castle during the siege?'

'I don't know, sir,' admits Edmund.

'For how long was it besieged?'

'I'm afraid I don't know, sir.'

Edmund stares straight ahead, his eyes lighting on the diagram of the castle that the master has chalked upon the board. He's so tired he can barely think straight, certainly can't recall what the master has been waffling about for the past hour, but the castle looks so familiar. The Calormenes had a stronghold like that, he recalls vaguely. He and Lucy once led an attack on it. He can't remember why, exactly - memories of the Golden Age have faded a little around the edges - but he recalls the castle, and recalls the battle itself... sometime before that business with Lune of Archenland's sons, he thinks, yes, it must have been before that Tarkaan - what was his name? - became smitten with Susan, because after that they were at peace...

The master is tapping his foot, waiting for an answer. The sound of his polished shoe hitting the ground pulls Edmund back to the present.

'Blast it all, boy, do you know anything?'

'I know how I'd attack it,' he says dreamily, to the consternation of the master and the amusement of his classmates.

After that disastrous lesson, during lunchtime, Peter once more contrives to catch up with Edmund. Gossip travels fast. Edmund is sitting alone against the trunk of a tree in the grounds, far from the other boys as they play football. Far enough that Peter feels a telling off wouldn't be overheard. It'll be seen, of course, because everyone watches everyone else, but then, another thing Peter never really needed to master was subtlety.

'You little idiot,' he says disgustedly, glaring at Edmund. 'What on Earth's got into you?'

'You heard, then,' says Edmund, and tries to grin despite the painful stripes that still sting his palms. Peter's not amused, though.

'Of course I heard, I have History after you do. I can't believe you sometimes, Ed. So much for blending in, I suppose!'

'Look,' Edmund tries to explain. 'I just ... I haven't been sleeping, lately, and it looked like...'

'I know what Harlech Castle looks like,' says Peter tightly. 'But I didn't feel the need to go running my mouth off about siege tactics when _I_ saw it!'

Edmund looks at his feet, just for a moment, and then looks up at his brother defiantly. He's about to say something, but Peter cuts him off, recognising that look and knowing that if he doesn't head Edmund off at the pass, then the argument will probably never end. 'Just forget it,' he says tiredly, every bit the weary older brother. 'I know what it's like too. But we aren't there, we're here. We have to deal with this now, all right? We have to be every bit here, or this isn't going to work.'

'I don't have to-' begins Edmund, but Peter stops him again. This argument is one they've had before, oh, so many times.

'You _do_ have to do what I say,' he says. 'Either here, because you're my brother, or there, because you swore loyalty to me as your High King.' Peter's eyes are fierce and leonine, his face commanding. This is Peter now: after their first visit he was all bluster and hope; not sure if Narnia was a dream or not, remembering a life of ruling but not sure if it was real, wanting so much to go back, to prove himself to himself. Now though, he knows it was real, has felt the weight of command on his shoulders a second time. It's matured him, and saddened him. And having known all that he is to Narnia, and all that it is to him, Peter has had to walk away from it, never to go back.

Looking at Peter now, Edmund suddenly isn't worried anymore. Peter never wanted Caspian. His love was always for Narnia itself.

'Remember,' says Peter, his voice rich and noble as it had been in Narnia, his confidence untarnished by rain and school dinners, 'you owe me your fealty, Edmund the Just.'

Peter walks off. Edmund hates the fact that his brother is right.

***

That night, before he gets to sleep, Edmund lies in bed and makes a decision. Perhaps he is going mad. Perhaps this is all Magic, or some sign, or simply fantasies made more potent by tiredness and hope. There is only one person who will know the difference. Edmund doesn't know if he can even be found in this unmagical country, but decides to try anyway.

They never talked much, he and Aslan, and they never spoke alone again after he was forgiven. Perhaps Aslan felt that all they needed to say was wrapped up in that brief time before the battle with the White Witch. Perhaps the very fact that he was forgiven was supposed to be enough. All Edmund knows is that he would have liked to have felt the same certainty as Lucy, or to have been guided as Peter was. He left it alone in Narnia, always telling himself that there would be time in the future, when Aslan would explain and things would make sense.

He cannot wait any longer. He has to know this. 'Aslan,' he whispers, trying to keep his voice steady, to sound kingly and worthy to take up Aslan's time. 'I would have speech with you, sire.' The old mode of speech drops easily from his lips, just as it always did, and abruptly he falls into a deep slumber.

_'Son of Adam, you are afraid.'_

'I ... don't think I am, Aslan,' says Edmund carefully, not meeting the eyes of the Lion.

'And you fear these dreams that you are having, dreams of Narnia and your old dominion there.'

'I do not fear them,' Edmund retorts, a shade more defensively than he intended. 'Sir.'

'Do you not? Perhaps then it would be more correct to say that you fear how much you like them. And you fear how much you think of the young King, Caspian. Would that be fairer, Edmund the Just?'

Edmund tries again. 'That's not ... I mean ... I don't understand why I'm having these dreams, Aslan. It wasn't like this last time.'

'You are older now, a different person than you were, but it is very natural to you to seek understanding. Very well. You understand, do you not, why you and your brother and sisters were sent from Narnia after the coronation?'

'I ... I do,' says Edmund hesitantly. 'The political balance there was too delicate ... If we'd stayed, Caspian's rule would have been weakened...' He knows, yes, but that doesn't mean he doesn't wish it could have been otherwise. Again he is assailed by the thought that if he'd only followed Caspian, that last night ...

Aslan chuckles, a deep rumble, almost like a purr. 'Although I sent you back for reasons you understand, you are unhappy with my timing, is that not so?' he asks.

'Aslan, I...'

'And you fear to disagree with me.'

'Aslan...' Edmund gives up, and looks up into the Lion's face. 'Couldn't we have stayed just a few more days? I ... he ... there were things I needed to ask him. Things we needed to say.'

'And you are certain that after just a few more days, you would have been satisfied?'

'Well...'

'You are young,' says Aslan warmly. 'You will learn.' He turns, and begins walk away on silent paws. 'Dream well, Edmund the Just. Use your judgement. Perhaps the opportunity you seek is yet to come. You will see that this was best.'

Edmund thinks that it is just like Aslan to be cryptic.

***

It is halfway through French the next day when Edmund, reciting conjugations, begins to ascertain the shape of a conclusion.

'J'ai, tu as-'

That was certainly Aslan in the dream. Edmund would know that Lion anywhere.

'- il a, elle a, nous avons-'

He knows about the dreams.

'-vouz avez-'

He would certainly have said something if he didn't approve of them.

'-ils ont, elles ont-'

But ... kissing boys is wrong, or at least, so vague hints delivered in stern ways from various masters and from the Head, Matron and the Chaplain have led Edmund to believe. He considers the punishments: a caning now; a life eternal in Hell later. The caning is unlikely to transpire, given he hasn't touched anyone. The prospect of Hell does occupy him briefly; after all, just because he's never been there doesn't mean there is no such place. He consults his Bible before bed; surely answers will lie there? He's read it before, of course, but this time he is actively searching for something, rather than reading it out of a sense of duty and for the satisfaction of memorising psalms and winning a prize at the end of term.

Things that he'd read before and dismissed as nonsense or stories take on new meanings now. It reads as if whoever wrote the Book was trying desperately to make sense of something that kept slipping out of reach. Edmund knows exactly how that feels.

Aslan knows, too. Aslan always knows, whether it is right or wrong. Edmund thinks that, probably, he asks too many questions. But Edmund always trusts that, when he doesn't know, Aslan will, and does. He's quite sure that these dreams he's having would fit quite snugly into the catalogue of sinning, a subject declaimed upon at length by the Chaplain and Matron. He's not sure where Aslan stands on sin, though, and he has much more compulsion to obey Aslan than the Chaplain, who is a slimy little man and worryingly reminiscent of some of the Telmarine Lords that Caspian had to remove from his counsels for being sycophants and bribe-takers. It certainly didn't sound like Aslan disapproved of Edmund's dreams and daydreams of the other king, and Edmund recalls strongly a conversation between Lucy and Susan on the subject of a suitor from Terebinthia.

It began, he recalls, after the man had left. Susan's face had fallen from its gracefully held smiles and blushes as soon as the door closed behind him. She looked tired, wearied almost to the limits of her inestimable patience by his simpering praise. She had made to leave, skirts sighing around her as she rose, but her hand was caught by Lucy's.

'Dost thou love him, sister?' she asked, straightforward as ever. Edmund had looked up from his reading as Susan replied.

'I ... we need this treaty with Terebinthia. Whether I love him or no, I see no other way to achieve that end.' The weariness in her voice stung him.

'By the Lion-' began Peter, but was quieted by a look from Lucy.

'We need it no more than we need thee on the throne, directing affairs here,' the youngest of them said. 'Ed can surely bring matters to a close without thy hand being the lure that ensnares that fat fish?'

'Only with extra expense, further coin and concessions. I would not have it said that my reluctance to wed were the cause of the beggaring of our nation,' said Susan, with a tiny toss of her head, a hint of the archer-queen who had taken to battle years before still shining below the façade of serenity. 'Nay, sister, I am too proud for that, tho' the prospect of marriage with him weighs heavily in my mind.'

'The prospect of a loveless marriage for you weighs on mine,' rejoined Lucy. 'It seems to me that to bestow your gracious hand for sake of a spurious peace would be against the designs of Aslan. For it has been many years that we have ruled here at Cair Paravel, and not once has he spurred any of us to ally ourselves.'

The argument went on for hours after that, for once Lucy and Susan began to debate they would not let it go lightly, being as opposite in their way as Edmund and Peter, but it was that moment that struck Edmund. Lucy always did know the mind of Aslan best, and she had been adamant that the way of Aslan was towards love, rather than expediency, to trust and belief, to noble causes and blind hopes.

Edmund has always been more cautious than Lucy, and usually it has served him well. But Aslan's presence always seems to swing that internal compass around and make fools of those who strive the hardest not to be foolish. Perhaps this time, just perhaps, Edmund thinks, it is time to strike out for the wild desire. Give in. Hope. _Believe_.

He reaches this decision just as the French master asks him to recite the conjugation to the class, which he manages reasonably credibly. French goes on for another half hour, leaving very little room for desires, wild or otherwise, and after that there is Mathematics to wrestle with, and History, which Edmund sits in, furiously taking notes and determined that the master will have nothing more to say to him about his behaviour or attentiveness. However, English cannot keep his attention; the ins and outs of sentence structure evade him, the room is too warm, the master drones ... and so, slowly and inexorably, he begins to daydream.

_He is in council. A fly is buzzing around in the vaulted ceiling. The day is warm, and Edmund guiltily realises he's been dozing when he ought to have been listening to the Ambassador from the Lone Islands. He straightens up in his seat, earning him a look from Susan that is half amusement and half disapproval. She knows him far too well._

The Ambassador finishes, something about tribute, and immediately three different people all rise and attempt to talk over one other. Peter calls for order.

The fly is still buzzing.

There is a stained glass window in this council chamber, a great Lion's head casting golden light over the room, gilding Peter's hair, brightening Susan's carefully-cultivated pale complexion.

Where is Lucy?

The Ambassador has brought someone with him, some part of his retinue. A serving-boy, it seems, for he brings wine to his master, pours it most carefully.

Edmund would like some wine. The day is warm and he is thirsty.

The Lion roars over their heads and the gilded light and the ruby wine are the jewel-bright hangings in Edmund's room, the serving boy is removing the warming pan from Edmund's sheets and the shirt from his own back.

The serving boy is Telmarine, and Edmund vaguely wonders how the Lone Islanders came to meet the Telmarines some hundreds of years too early.

The serving boy is Caspian, and Edmund thinks it is a shame that kings must fall from grace, himself to schoolboy and Caspian to hired help, but the bed is warm from the embers in the warming pan, and Caspian's eyes are warmer, and his skin under Edmund's palms is warmer still, and his lips are like fire where they touch Edmund's face, and Edmund knows just how ungrammatical this thought is being. He cannot think of anything but getting closer to what he wants; he growls, low in his throat, determined to take, but all has been given, they are naked, they are moving under sheets in frantic conjunction, and he is close, he is there, he is in between the sheets and in between Caspian's thighs, and -

'Pevensie!'

There are more stripes of crimson on his palms that afternoon.

***

Edmund does not dream again, whether by day or by night, for several days, and he is glad. He isn't sure what to think of the last one. He did not know he had that wanton desire in him; he's used to being the quiet one, the practical one, the level-headed one, from a time when the four of them, Kings and Queens of Narnia, were a unit. This kind of lust, this kind of passion ... this is what he would have expected from Peter. The questions that have arisen in his mind occupy him to such an extent that, for the first time, a gang of older boys try to grab him in the bathroom, and succeed.

There are three of them, and only one of Edmund, and he is younger. They expect an easy conquest. They are wrong.

Edmund is standing at the washbasin, rinsing his hands, when he feels someone coming up behind him. Knowing that whoever it is cannot be planning anything pleasant, he thinks fast. Either he kicks, or he grabs. The floor underfoot is tiled, and wet. A backwards kick would thrust him off balance. Instead, he plants his feet further apart, and thrusts his hands behind him, grabs whatever he can reach and squeezes cruelly, turning in the same instant to see that there are three boys surrounding him and that he has one of them by the groin.

The boy in question has turned a cheesy white colour, and wrenches away. Edmund makes for the door, only to be blocked by the other two assailants. They grab at him, and the first boy draws a fist back to punch Edmund, his face a twisted mask of pain and anger, but Edmund ducks, and the punch connects with someone else's face. The punched boy falls, and Edmund darts away yet again.

The third boy tries to grab him, but only succeeds in tripping over his prone friend, and smashing his face on what Edmund assumes is the washbasin, though he doesn't see exactly what happens, because by this point he's slipped out of the door and is already half a corridor away. He finds out later that the boy broke his nose, and that his friends had run away rather than be caught by the masters. He worries a little that his name might have been mentioned, but when evening comes with no retribution, he assumes that none of them wanted to bring attention to having been bested by a younger boy.

The fight makes him think even more though. He has no doubts about why they were circling round behind him, or what they intended to do to him. He has no doubts about the fact that he would not have enjoyed it one jot. He wonders mainly about why they do it. To someone whose only real experience of the physical side of love is one brief, almost chaste, kiss, taking pleasure in such force seems inconceivable.

***

_As the dawn breaks, Edmund is back in Narnia, on the top of the tower of Caspian's castle. Caspian is stepping away from him, looking wary and shy. 'I'm glad this was the right place, at least for a little while,' he says raggedly._

Their eyes lock, their hands lock, Caspian's around Edmund's waist and Edmund's around Caspian's neck, and they stare. The moon over Caspian's shoulder throws silver spangles on his hair and that hint of frost almost makes Edmund panic

\- the Witch, the Stag ... don't make me leave! -

until he sees the love and the golden tawny tint in Caspian's dark and dilated eyes. This moment is warm and cold all at once, and their breath mists in the air.

The tower floor looms up fast, and cold flagstones knock the breath from Edmund as Caspian arches over him, a moan escaping the older boy's lips as Edmund drags his hands through Caspian's hair and down over flesh.

These are the things Edmund will remember later; Caspian's leg is between Edmund's thighs, Caspian's hand is hovering over Edmund's waistband, Caspian's mouth is hot against Edmund's collarbone. Caspian, Caspian, Caspian, all over everywhere at once.

Edmund is painfully aware of Caspian's hand and wishes that he had the courage to grab it, to give Caspian the permission he obviously wants. Instead he arches up underneath the older boy, pressing them together.

But when Caspian does finally slide his hand past nightwear and onto Edmund's sweat-damped skin, Edmund gasps, and Caspian draws back hurriedly.

It seems the cold gets everywhere, and, stung by the desire to exclude it, Edmund brings Caspian's hand to his mouth and gently licks the palm, then the fingers, as Caspian closes his eyes and shivers.

Caspian's eyes gleam with mischief as he suddenly thrusts his hand back in and - Edmund gasps, feeling Caspian slowly start moving his warm, moist hand up and down...

'Caspian, please...' Shyness is forgotten, as Edmund tears at Caspian's nightshirt.

Edmund thought he was demanding, but Caspian is more so, and the door to the tower is cold behind him and Caspian in front of him is sinfully hot, and they push at each other, sweaty and slick and full of so much desire but so frantically unsure of what to do, and suddenly something is growing, some wave is cresting somewhere inside him and it's all too much. Edmund convulsively crushes Caspian to him and is vaguely aware of a choked moan from the prince as a feeling of unbelievable heat cascades through him. He sags back, Caspian draped bonelessly over him, and the pair of them sink slowly to the floor.

Caspian is in Edmund's lap, fierce eyes all warmly protective and sated.

Edmund jerks awake, heart hammering in his chest. Around him, the dorm is dark, and silent. He exhales deeply, willing the dream to leave him; it is too confusing, too painful.

He lies awake for a long time, Caspian's face dancing on the back of his eyelids, smiling, teasing, never quite fully formed. Is this how Susan feels? He wonders, digging the heels of his hands into his eyesockets, willing the vision to leave him, for sleep to claim him, though he is almost afraid to sleep. He is certainly afraid of where his dreams will take him next. A part of him is not quite sure why he fears so much, but Edmund squashes it, rolling over to bury his face into the pillow.

He is tired again, the next day, inattentive and careless, and incurs the wrath of the Latin master with distracted insolence, and as he holds out his hands and listens to the whistle of the cane tearing the air, his mind sees only the cold glint in the White Witch's eye as the whip falls.

She did beat him, that once. He's almost forgotten about it, in the wake of all else that she did. It was her expression that he was more concerned with, when it happened. This was a woman totally consumed by the knowledge that her desires were the only true way for a world to be run. That has made him suspicious of people who take for their own sake. It caused friction in court, it caused friction at home: Edmund quietly and calmly telling Susan to think of consequences when she flirts; Edmund angrily shouting at Peter not to be such an idiot, not to be so selfish, that Narnia cannot afford for him to risk himself in single combat; Edmund fiercely grabbing Lucy's shoulders and telling her that if she ventures onto that battlefield she will be cut to ribbons, and then where will that leave all who look to her for healing and for strength?

He cannot escape the memory of the Witch's face that day, and then again, when he shattered her wand, her Magic, and her hold on the land. When she was gone, they took over. Aslan put four children on four thrones, and trusted in them to keep their own brands of selfishness from ruining everything.

Edmund fervently hopes that Aslan was right in what he did. He doesn't feel, at this moment, the slightest bit responsible. He's exhausted, he hasn't slept properly in weeks, he's keeping up with his Prep and so forth, but only just. He can barely manage to be a schoolboy, he thinks, resting his face in his throbbing hands. How on Earth can he ever be a king again?

***

_ Edmund has been in many fights in his life - lives - and they've all more or less been for honour, and there've been fights for duty and for anger and for hate, and there've been fights for necessity, fights for defence and offence, but Edmund has never had to fight to _defend _ his right to have a fight before._

But Caspian is plainly angry, and Edmund doesn't understand why, except it has something to do with his battle with the Witch, something to do with his escape from shame at the hands of three boys, something to do with Caspian's jealousy and possessiveness, and Edmund doesn't know why it's his fault.

'How dare they lay hands on a King of Narnia?'

'They dare because they do not know,' he says. 'I don't know any more, either. Am I still a king?'

'Of course you are still a king, my King.'

Caspian kneels then, and Edmund thinks that one king ought not to kneel to another. He never knelt to Peter, and Caspian didn't either, and he and Caspian are supposed to be equals, and so he gets on his knees as well, determined to keep them equal and surprised when Caspian gently but inexorably forces him backwards.

This is worship, and this is equality, and this is loyalty, swearing fealty with hands and lips and hearts and minds. Never to be together, perhaps, but never to be apart, always chasing, never catching, but never separated, like Zeus and Ganymede, two sides of the same vase. To put them together would spoil the balance, but to cease the chase would ruin the masterpiece.

Edmund wakes, to pale sunlight filtering through the curtains, dappling his pillow and turning floating dust into tiny particles of gold, and knows that Aslan was right, as always.

Peter will settle, grow up in England. Edmund will always be there to support him, but that's not the only thing he will ever be; Peter's shadow, Peter's prop. Edmund will go back. He'll be needed and useful again. He and Peter need time apart. Together they've grown strong; without each other's support they will grow stronger.

Susan's place is here now, too. They can all see it, how comfortable, how settled she is. This is her home. And Lucy's young enough that she can still hold two worlds in her mind and in her heart. She's eager to go back to Narnia, but in the interim, this world holds so much that she loves as well that she will be content. Love is everything to Lucy, as home is everything to Susan.

While they are gone, Caspian will become a strong king; the leader Narnia needs to bring her through after the Telmarine occupation. He needs the time to establish himself; with the Kings of Old around he would never get to stand by himself.

And for Edmund himself? He will watch; watch his siblings, watch himself. And he will wait. Things are easier now. Now that he knows the why of it, the reason he had to leave. He can wait for Narnia, for his time there to come again. He can even wait for Caspian; after all, it is not for him to decide when he will be needed again. The flow of time and Magic may never bring them together again, but if all else fails, at least he has his dreams.


End file.
